Five debut authors. Five books. One big dance toward publication.

What NOT to say…

For the past few days, I’ve been hard at work incorporating my editor’s suggestions into my second book, SKIPPING A BEAT. I’ve been pondering the plot and characters and yes, the dialogue. Since I’ve been trying to get my prose right, I thought it would be fun to use this space today to deliberately mess up. To write the worst dialogue I can dream up. To belly-flop with abandon.

I love dialogue that makes me laugh, and I particularly enjoy characters who know each other so well, and are so comfortable with one another, that their banter teeters on the line between insulting and affectionate. Marian Keyes, a fabulous Irish writer, is a master at this. In one of her books (I believe it’s Rachel’s Holiday, but I can’t find my copy to verify it), the main character is dropped off at a rehab facility by her father and snarky younger sister. “Weave me something nice, nutjob,” the sister says by way of good-bye. I think that line provides more insight into their relationship than ten pages of backstory.

Here are a few absolutely wretched lines I just dreamed up. And I’d love it if you’d chime in with an awful line or two of dialogue of your own in the comments section.

“Hello, ex-wife! How strange to see you here on my doorstep, when I was just stepping out for a jog in my new blue Nike sneakers!”

“Would I like to come with you around the corner to get a bite to eat? Why, yes, I would like to come with you around the corner to get a bite to eat.”

“Her eyes were the cerulean blue of an ocean at mid-day, and teardrops glistened in them like tiny diamonds. Which would hurt, had they actually been diamonds.”